


this is halloween

by SalomeWeil



Series: holiday season [1]
Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Drinking, Explicit Language, F/M, Fluff, Halloween, Halloween Costumes, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Mild Language, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-01
Updated: 2017-11-01
Packaged: 2019-01-28 00:28:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,267
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12593984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SalomeWeil/pseuds/SalomeWeil
Summary: Rey is a stressed-out introvert who barely manages to hand out candy on Halloween, let alone socialize. When she takes a chance on a party down the hall, will she regret it or will it be the best Halloween ever? Featuring fluff, an unrecognizable Kylo Ren, mistreated hummus, the Teal Pumpkin Project, and Bon Iver's Holocene.





	this is halloween

Rey was definitely not paying any attention to where she was going. After all, she knew her way up the stairs and down the hallway to her apartment door like it was the back of her hand. Why should she bother actually paying attention to getting her feet one in front of the other and avoiding other people? She had better things to do, like keep a tight grip on the multiple bags of candy in her hands, sans shopping bags, and plan out what she had to do in order to get into her costume and get the candy station set up in the thirty minutes she had before Trick or Treating officially started in her apartment complex. 

 

Which was how she ended up eating into those thirty minutes by running into someone, dropping the bags, and bruising her nose on the chainmail her assailant was wearing.

 

“Shit!” she exclaimed, first rubbing at her nose, then dropping to her knees to hurriedly pick up the bags of candy. She dropped her keys in her haste, bruised her knees, and hit her head against the sword her assailant was wearing when he tried to bend down and help. “Oh, ow! Fuck all!” she moaned, falling back on her rear end and holding a hand to her head. 

 

“Oh, fuck!” her assailant replied before dropping to a knee as well. “Are you ok?”

 

“Just dandy,” Rey replied, still rubbing her head. She spared a glance at the man. 

 

“4D, right?” he said. 

 

She eyed him up and down before getting back to her knees and scooping up the bags he was holding out to her. 

 

“That’s right,” she reluctantly confirmed. She took in the giant’s stature, the shaggy black hair peeking out from beneath a medieval hood, and the piercing brown eyes staring her down and hazarded a guess. “4B?”

 

“Yes,” he said. He stood up and tried to offer her a hand, but she ignored it and struggled to her feet on her own. He quirked an eyebrow up, but didn’t say anything more. Just as she started to give an off-hand “thanks” for his help picking up her stuff, a phone’s ring sounded from somewhere underneath all his chainmail. It would have been comical if she hadn’t been so unnerved by the encounter. 

 

He immediately started digging through his costume and when he found the phone, he answered it without any delay. Rey stood there awkwardly for a moment longer, wondering if he had expected to talk to her more, before deciding she didn’t care. 

 

She now had twenty-five minutes to get everything ready.

 

After attempting to catch his eye once and failing, she just shrugged and walked around him to continue down the hall to her door. He turned and waved as she passed him, and she offered him the smallest wave in the history of waves in response before inserting her key into her lock and escaping his presence for good. 

 

If she thought he’d also started to say something to her just as she closed her apartment door behind her, well, it wasn’t her fault she didn’t respond. He was the one on a phone call, after all.

 

______________________________________

  
  


“Happy Halloween!” Rey said brightly, smiling and holding out the bowl of candy to the kids gathered outside her apartment door.  “Take a handful!”

 

Over the din of squealing, happy children, she could hear her words being echoed all up and down the hallway by the other adults handing out candy. 

 

“Trick or Treat!” came the chorus of children’s and teenager’s voices, interspersed by parents who held up their adorably clad babies and plastic pumpkins. 

 

“Excuse me,” came a small voice to her left as she was focusing on just such a baby and parent combination. Rey glanced down and saw a little girl in a cowboy outfit. She smiled. 

 

“What’s up?”

 

“Um, you have a sign up outside your door...about the Teal Pumpkin Project?”

 

Rey’s features softened immediately. “I sure do. Would you like to pick a non-food treat?”

 

The girl nodded shyly and held up her decorated pumpkin. Rey said goodbye to the parent and and baby and then reached behind her for the bowl of non-food treats. Inside were stickers, wristbands, and bubble wands. 

 

“You’re the first to get to choose tonight,” Rey said, bending down to get at her level. “Pick whatever you want.”

 

The girl’s eyes lit up and she reached out a hand, hovering over one or two items before finally settling on the sheet of stickers. 

 

“Thanks so much,” she gushed.

 

“You’re welcome!” Rey replied and gave the girl a high-five before she straightened up. The girl grinned and moved along down the hallway while Rey watched her go. She started towards the stairs, passing another open apartment door, and Rey found her eyes drawn to the open doorway only to meet the gaze of Mr. 4B. 

 

He gave her a nod and smile and Rey furrowed her brow in response. She’d never been friends, let alone acquaintances, with anyone in her complex, and the sudden camaraderie Mr. 4B seemed to be feeling was irritating to a self-imposed loner like herself. But she supposed that was what holidays, especially communal holidays like Halloween, did to some people. 

 

She was just exchanging treat bowls for the next group of children to come by when there was an awkward sounding cough from outside her door. 

 

“Sorry, I’ll be right -” She turned and saw Mr. 4B. “Oh. I thought you were, uh…”

 

“Yeah, there seems to be a lull in the crowd for a moment,” he responded. He smiled at her then, with a broad, gleaming mouthful of mostly straight teeth, and she swallowed hard.

 

“Um, can I help you?” she finally asked as they stood before one another, her holding the candy bowl in front of her like a shield. 

 

“Just wanted to invite you over later. I’m having a party once the Trick or Treating is finished. Some of my friends are over already. But they’re just watching movies right now.”

 

“Oh, ok. Um, thanks, I guess?”

 

“Sure thing.” He hesitated before leaving and Rey began to shift her weight on her feet. She could feel her skin prickling beneath the heavy cloak she was wearing - she’d opted for her go-to Hogwarts student costume again this year, but damn if it wasn’t uncomfortable. 

 

“Was there something else?” she finally blurted out and he flushed. She wondered if he’d been drinking. 

 

“Yeah. No, just the invite. I invited everyone on the floor, but, you know, most of them seem to have kids, so I doubt most of our neighbors will make it.”

 

“Oh. Great. Well, maybe I’ll drop by. I have an early shift at work, though, so.”

 

“I understand.” He smiled again anyway and started back over to his apartment door just as a new gaggle of kids and parents came up the stairs. She was about to relax when he turned his head and winked. “Nice costume, by the way.”

 

Startled, Rey blurted out the first response that came to mind. “Thanks. I like yours, too.”

 

He laughed. “Yeah, sorry the chainmail did so much damage.”

 

Rey started to say something else, but her thoughts and her conversation partner were soon swallowed up by more children, adorable costumes, and cries of “Happy Halloween!” She didn’t have time to get a word in edgewise again for another two hours, let alone wonder what Mr. 4B thought of her.

 

And she definitely, totally didn’t care.

 

______________________

  
  


8:30 PM finally rolled around and Rey found herself glad of it as she waved after the last group of straggling Trick or Treaters. The sound of music, smell of food, and riotous laughter drifting from the open door of 4B had been growing stronger as the night progressed and Rey was ready to close her door and shut the merrymaking out. Tomorrow was a work day, after all. An early shift, as she’d explained to Mr. 4B, and it promised to be a brutal one. The morning after a holiday like Halloween was always brutal in the local emergency rooms. Too many pranks gone wrong, or pranks gone right as the case may be, or, on the tame end of the spectrum of holiday disasters, too many candies stuck up noses, or costumes that wouldn’t come off. 

 

But even with her door closed she could smell the foods Mr. 4B’s guests must have been dining on, and feel the vibrations of the party music through the walls, and before she knew it, she was shrugging her Hogwarts robe back on and checking herself out in the mirror. 

 

Then she was rolling up the waistband of her skirt to show off a little more thigh and unbuttoning one more button on her collared shirt before loosening her house tie. Her hands went through her hair once, twice, and she even bit her lips a few times. She refused to apply more lip-gloss. 

 

Then she was walking out of her apartment and down the hall to 4B, before her common sense got the best of her. 

 

“It’s barely nine o’clock,” she muttered to herself as she came to a stop outside 4B. “Plenty of time to socialize adequately, steal some free food, and get back to my apartment before I turn into a pumpkin.”

 

Her knuckles had just grazed the door in the barest imitation of a knock when it was pulled open. 

 

“And you are?” came the smug tones of  _ not  _ Mr. 4B. Rey blinked several times and then rolled her eyes.

 

“I’m in 4D. I was invited earlier, by, you know, the man who actually lives here?”

 

She crossed her arms and somewhere behind the snob with the carrot top came a snort of laughter. 

 

“Let her in, Hux!” Mr. 4B called. 

 

Hux wrinkled his nose, but muttered something resembling an apology as he opened the door wider and stood back to let Rey inside.

 

“What’s your name?” he asked and Rey was utterly disinclined to answer, but she was beaten to it by, again, Mr. 4B, who chose that moment to walk over through the scattered groups of guests. 

 

“Rey, isn’t it?” he asked and Rey’s brows must have betrayed her surprise because the man’s chainmail shook as he laughed. “I noticed your nameplate when we were both at the mailbox one day.”

 

“How astute,” she replied cooly. Mr. 4B held out a cider to her. She took it with a tight smile of thanks. “I’m afraid I can’t return the notice.”

 

“Ah. Well, that’s simple enough. This is dear old Kylo - oof!” Hux finished, doubling over as 4B’s elbow caught him in the stomach. 

 

“Go bother Phas,” the taller, broader man said and Hux, after glaring at him, walked away with a stiff sort of dignity that made Rey want to laugh. 

 

Once Hux was out of earshot, 4B - Kylo, apparently - turned back to her. Rey suddenly wondered if she looked as nervous as she felt, or just tired and irritated. 

 

“You came.” He sounded happy. 

 

“Yeah,” she said. “Um, should I have brought something?”

 

“No, God, no. We have plenty of garbage here. Would you, uh, like something to eat?”

 

She fiddled with the twist off cap of her cider. “Sure.” Then, because he did seem, strangely, so glad to see her, and because she was a decent person who didn’t want to be there on false pretenses, she added, “I can’t stay long.”

 

“I understand. I have to be at the courthouse by 8 tomorrow, myself.”

 

“Courthouse?”

 

“I’m a lawyer. Most of us are.” He indicated his guests with a sweep of one hand. “You’re a nurse?”

 

“P.A.”

 

“Ah. Sorry.”

 

“Don’t be. You see someone in scrubs, one guess is as good as another.”  She found herself wondering how often they’d crossed paths, for him to have noticed these details about her. She could recall seeing him once or twice, but she kept to herself so much…

 

“Right. So,” he went on, gesturing over to the food spread out along a nearby kitchen counter, “there’s pizza, and a pretty sad offering of vegetables and - oh, God, don’t eat that hummus. It’s been sitting out for three hours already and...you know what, forget the hummus.” He dumped the dregs of the dip into a nearby garbage can while Rey tried not to laugh. “Anyway. Where was I? Chips and guac. Someone brought shrimp cocktail, the pretentious bastard, and over there are brownies, Halloween candy, lemon bars, macaroons - I know a lot of pretentious bastards, apparently.”

 

Rey laughed out loud at that and Kylo looked down at her, a smug grin on his face. 

 

“I’m glad you came,” he offered and Rey swallowed the rest of her laughter. She fiddled with the bottle in her hands and found herself giving him an almost shy glance from beneath her lashes. 

 

“Yeah? I guess...thanks for inviting me. I’m glad I came, too.”

 

“Good,” Kylo replied, almost fiercely, and Rey suddenly felt caught in his gaze. She managed to tear her eyes away and took another drink from her cider, eyeing some point on the wall beyond him. The atmosphere, the costumes, the bottle in hand, the intensity of his stare...they all reminded her forcefully of her university days - not so long past - and the poor decision making skills that had led her to live by herself, take no chances, invest in few friendships, and never stay out past eight. 

 

Yet here she was, in a stranger’s apartment, in the middle of a party, cautiously flirting, when said stranger had never actually apologized for running her over in the hallway earlier, and had clearly noticed her months ago, and had presumed on her time and good will…she didn’t even know for sure that he had invited their other neighbors, for God’s sake. She was a complete idiot, she never should have come -

 

“Rey? Did you hear me?”

 

“What?” she refocused on the man in front of her. He was reaching around her, one arm outstretched to someone else who was trying to come inside the already crowded kitchen space. She was merely in the way. “Oh, sorry,” she said and shifted to her right. She felt some of her anxiety fade as she realized she knew the person. It was another neighbor, from apartment 4A, she thought. She glanced at Kylo again, who was saying hello to the man and giving the same apologetic spiel about pretentious food offerings. 

 

Kylo wasn’t one of the monsters from her past. He was just a man in a Halloween costume, throwing a party like you do, and being neighborly about it. She smiled suddenly, brightly, up at him and caught his eye.

 

He stumbled over his words to the other man and gave her a puzzled look, but a moment later his mouth stretched into a smile as well. Then he was extracting himself from the conversation and moving closer to her, but not daring to put an arm around her shoulders quite yet.

 

She wished he would.

 

“Wanna go watch the movie? Or dance, or I think someone’s playing Clue in the office -”

 

“Dancing sounds good,” she said, feeling brave.

 

“It does? Great,” he said and seemed almost relieved. She wondered if it was possible he was as nervous as she was. She wondered if it was the good kind of nervous, that gave you butterflies and filled you with delicious anticipation. 

 

Rey tipped her bottle back and took a long swig, knowing she probably wasn’t going to finish it, and then set it on the counter. “Well? Come on, then,” she said and grabbed his hand before she could change her mind. 

 

If her touch felt like an electric current to him, he didn’t let it show. But it only took a split second for his larger hand to close around hers and that toothy grin he’d given her earlier was back permanently as he led her between groups of gyrating people in the makeshift rave in his living room.

 

In a crowd of sexy witches, maids, and cats, Rey felt horribly overdressed in her Hogwarts robe and sweater vest, even with her skirt hiked up and buttons undone - but her state of dress didn’t seem to bother Kylo, whose chainmail jingled and jangled with every gyration of his hips and intimate move she made against him. 

 

If he was embarrassed by the amount of noise he was making unrelated to the grinding and making out going on around them, he didn’t let on. Not that Rey cared, either - the music was so loud it covered up most of the noise the crowd was making, anyway. Besides, she couldn’t remember the last time she’d danced with a guy who actually seemed into her and wasn’t a blind date or one of her already committed and gay friends.

 

This Halloween was definitely an improvement on the last.

 

“I’m glad you came,” Kylo shouted at her over the music at her. 

 

Rey laughed again. “You already said that!”

 

“Yeah?” He got a gleam in his eye and pulled her closer. “Well, it’s still true!”

 

Rey felt a blush creep over her cheeks and tried to focus on how his arms felt around her and how the rhythm of the music suffused her bones. There was a lull in the playlist and Kylo took advantage of it to lean nearer and lower his voice.

 

“So, when do you turn into a pumpkin?”

 

Rey rolled her eyes. “You mean when do I have to go?”

 

“What, not sexy?” he said, laughing.

 

“No. And the answer is thirty minutes.”

 

“Not much time,” he pointed out, looking a little crestfallen and mischievous all at once. Rey quirked an eyebrow up at him. 

 

“Or just enough,” she replied coolly as the next song came on and she slid her arms back around his waist. 

 

“Or just enough,” he echoed, running his hands along her arms and then pulling her closer to sway to Bon Iver. 

 

“What did you do, make a playlist with every song that ever mentioned Halloween?” Rey found herself joking, but when she looked up at him, Kylo wasn’t smiling. The intensity was back in his gaze and instead of answering her question, he tightened his hold on her and hummed the tune back at her. Stray lyrics found their way past his lips and Rey was held, entranced.

 

“ ...and at once I knew I was not magnificent…”

 

Caught in his grip, spelled safe and warm by the body heat filling the apartment and the noise of the other revelers that cocooned them as they danced, Rey found her lids drifting shut and her head resting heavily on the broad plane of his chest. He made some contented noise deep within and Rey couldn’t help relaxing into the curve of his arms even more as the music lulled her into bittersweet nostalgia and hope at the same time.

 

As it turned out, in the dim view of jack-o-lanterns and fairy lights, and the all encompassing magic of All Hallows’ Eve, thirty minutes was both quite and not enough. And she suddenly found herself wondering if suggesting a Friendsgiving get- together would be too forward.

 

Somehow, judging by the way his chin was now resting on top of her head and his hands were rubbing lazy circles along her back, she doubted it.

 

____________________________________________

  
  


**_You are cordially invited to..._ **

 

_ Friendsgiving _

 

_ Hanukkah First Night _

 

_ Christmas Wonderland _

 

_ New Year’s Eve Party _

 

_ St. Patrick’s Day Kegger _

 

**_Apartment 4B, casual dress, BYOB, unpretentious noshes are welcome_ **

**Author's Note:**

> I really wanted to write a fluffy holiday one-shot. Hope you enjoyed it. Cheers! Happy Halloween/All Saints' Day!


End file.
